Policy Brief

Transatlantic Security and Future of NATO Series

September 2015

Summary: In this brief, the

author highlights and questions
the various views of Europe in
the U.S. strategic community.
This paper offers a balanced
reflection of the U.S. engagement in European security,
and the need for better understanding of mutual interests at
the transatlantic level.

Europe to Planet America: Stay With Us,

But Dont Stampede Us
Prospects and Limits of a Transatlantic Division of
Security Responsibilities
by Constanze Stelzenmller
As the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign gears up, and conflicts
on the other side of the Atlantic
multiply, two opposing views of what
the United States should do about
European security are competing for
airspace in the U.S. public debate:
Lets Get Out of There: The United
States no longer has any business
being engaged in Europes security.
It should let the (mild expletive
deleted) Europeans deal with their
own problems and focus on more
urgent concerns elsewhere.
We Have to Get Back in There:
Europe will collapse/implode/
be invaded by polite green men/
the self-proclaimed Islamic State
group/migrants, unless the U.S. of
A takes the reins again, rides to the
front, and saves the day.
Both of these prescriptions are off
base. They do not even accurately
describe the state of the current transatlantic division of labor.

The German Marshall Fund

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In reality, the United States and European governments have not worked
so closely together on key security
issues, nor so successfully, in quite a
while. After Ukraines Euromaidan

uprising in February 2014, Washington together with Berlin, Paris,

Warsaw and other capitals on the
continent hammered out a consensus
on sanctions against Russia. Those
sanctions remain in place. They had
a substantial effect on the markets,
and they came as a highly unpleasant
surprise to the government of President Vladimir Putin. Meanwhile,
NATO the military arm of the
transatlantic alliance is ramping
up its capabilities. Several European
governments (including Germany)
are increasing their defense budgets,
sometimes to their own astonishment.
More recently, Julys Iran deal
concluded more than a decade of
tense negotiations, after some neardisastrous failures, dead-ends, and
dangerous brinksmanship. U.S.,
British, French, German, and Russian
negotiators managed to bridge very
different interests, attitudes, and
expectations, and ended up playing
as a tightly coordinated diplomatic
tag team a fact that did not fail to
impress the government in Teheran.
Neither the current stalemate in
Ukraine nor the Iran deal are perfect
outcomes; far from it. But it is safe

Transatlantic Security and Future of NATO Series

Policy Brief
to say that in both cases, a concerted effort at transatlantic
diplomacy averted war. European governments contrary
to popular misconception, at least in the United States
played significant roles, and even took the lead. Indeed, the
administration of President Barack Obama gave them the
space to do so. Ukraine and Iran are excellent examples of
what close transatlantic security cooperation can achieve
when the United States and Europe share a sense of threat.
But that is also the bad news: it took the very real risk of a
major conflagration involving states with nuclear weapons,
and possibly willing to use them, to force the allies to focus
and work together.

Ukraine and Iran are excellent

examples of what close
transatlantic security cooperation
can achieve when the United
States and Europe share a sense
of threat.
On the machine room level of policy implementation
and transactional diplomacy, the state of transatlantic
cooperation is actually pretty good. It is mostly pragmatic,
constructive, and based on a broad set of shared interests
and values. In fact, it is no exaggeration to say that the
United States and the European Union have been developing a new appreciation for each other. Europeans have
been watching with some admiration as Obama ticks off
his foreign policy legacy list (Iran and Cuba recently, but
Guantanamo is still work in progress), at the same time
finding a much more relaxed and confident voice to talk
about domestic concerns such as race. The fact that the
U.S. Supreme Court rescued the administrations healthcare legislation and acknowledged the right to same-sex
marriage within a week thrilled many on the other side of
the Atlantic. Feelings in the United States about Europe
are perhaps a bit more mixed; criticism of our handling of
the Greek crisis has been mostly scathing. But European
governments unexpected readiness to stand up to Russia
2

has left a favorable impression in Washington. As for the

Iran deal, it took the United States to get it clinched but
Europeans (and a German initiative) brought it to the table
in the first place.
Absent imminent disaster, however, the transatlantic
record of cooperation on security risks and threats is a lot
less impressive. We are flailing in the fight against ISIS, and
seem powerless to stop the disastrous civil war in Syria,
or sectarian conflict in Iraq. We are rooted to the ground
watching a multi-tentacled Chinese foreign policy that
ranges from island-building in East Asian seas to laying
transport lines across Eurasia to gobbling up textile factories in Italy and the U.S. South. A Russia crumbling under
its own inability to modernize and adapt to globalization
is surely a daunting prospect, but one for which we appear
unprepared. Our track record in shoring up states and their
societies against the risk of disintegration and helping them
to transform (Tunisia, say, or Ukraine) is dismal. As for the
Wests most noble achievement after ending the last world
war in 1945 building and maintaining the norms and
institutions that supported a liberal and open international
order for 70 years we seem today to be doing almost no
building and little maintenance.
Our strategic situations are also very different. The United
States, with its global remit, has no lack of urgent concerns
but none of those currently threaten its primacy in the
international order, much less its existence. Europeans,
in contrast, are facing a dizzying array of domestic and
external security threats, the worst since the Cold War
order collapsed a generation ago. The sovereign debt crisis
continues to grip the continent. It has produced a festering
North-South divide, with slow growth, high levels of
youth unemployment, and badly managed immigration
feeding a toxic compound of anti-globalization, anti-EU,
and anti-foreigner populist sentiment. Russia is stoking
war in Ukraine, intimidating its neighbors from Belarus
to the Caucasus, and insistently probing the vulnerabilities of EU members great and small. In Northern Africa
and the Middle East, the postwar regional order is crumbling, producing a mass outpouring of refugees. To quote
Swedens former prime minister, Carl Bildt, Europe appears
to be surrounded by a ring of fire. And it is not just the
neighborhood, but the European project itself that is under
threat.

The German Marshall Fund of the United States

September 2015

Transatlantic Security and Future of NATO Series

Policy Brief
Under the circumstances, it is hard not to have some
sympathy for the Lets Get Out of Here camp. Americans
have every right to expect Europeans to do more to tackle
their own problems and those of their neighborhood after
providing a security umbrella for the democratic nations
(and some undemocratic, but non-Communist ones) of the
continent for the better part of a century. The United States
has legitimate security concerns elsewhere on the globe,
the largest but by no means the only one being the rise of
China. Ordinary Americans are understandably tired of
war, and wary of new entanglements.

Americans have every right to

expect Europeans to do more to
tackle their own problems and
those of their neighborhood.
Still, there are compelling reasons for the United States
to stay engaged in and with Europe. Executive Summary
for the Nervous, Part One: Most of our concerns are your
concerns, too. Here are some examples:
Shale gas exploitation has made the United States far
less dependent on the Middle Easts oil. But Israels security remains a paramount interest, as does containing
Irans hegemonic ambitions. The United States needs
a stable Egypt and Saudi Arabia as allies. For all this,
Europes diplomatic heft, its trade power, and, yes, the
weapons it supplies to allies, are critical.
Russias cooperation remains important for dealing with
burning U.S. regional and global concerns (Afghanistan,
Syria, Iran, counterterrorism). According to U.S. realists like John Mearsheimer or Stephen Walt, Ukraine
(Russias victim) is at best a second-order problem for
the transatlantic relationship. But Moscow has violated
principles territorial sovereignty, the right to choose
alliances that go to the heart of what the West, and
particularly the United States, stand for. Sacrificing
these on the altar of expediency is unlikely to gain
Putins respect, or make him a more amenable partner.
Sanctions, on the other hand, have (together with falling
oil prices and a declining Russian economy) sent an
3

unambiguous Western message of condemnation and

increased the cost of Russias aggression. They would be
meaningless without European support, which, by the
way, comes at a much higher price.
The United States and Europes economies have become
deeply integrated through mutual trade and investment,
creating a lot of wealth and jobs. As the financial crisis
showed, it also made us more vulnerable to disruptions
and contagion on either side of the Atlantic. Europes
inability to resolve its sovereign debt crisis would be
highly damaging for U.S. business interests, and the U.S.
economy. It would also undercut any effort by Europe
to carry a greater share of the transatlantic security
burden.
Last but not least, Europe shares many U.S. values and
its fundamental preference for a liberal international
order. Its support provides legitimacy and leverage to
what otherwise would often appear as U.S. unilateralism. The United States would be strong enough to deal
with a belligerent Russia and a Middle East in flames on
its own. But that would be lonely, costly, and wearying.
Sharing the burden is cheaper.
But the We Have To Get Back in There faction does not have
it right either notwithstanding the numerous Eastern
Europeans clamoring for the United States to bring back
Cold-War levels of troops and armaments to Europe.
Executive Summary for the Nervous, Part Two: We need
the United States to stick with us, but not to stampede us.
These are the arguments:
In case of a war in Europe, we would need massive U.S.
help, and it is hard to imagine that the United States
would not come to the rescue. But like a deliberate,
Article V-type attack against a NATO member state
it is the least likely thing to happen. Fixating on this
scenario is dangerous, because it prevents preparation,
and cooperation, for much more likely risks, such as the
accidental escalation of a minor conflict.
Short of major war, we have to assume the United States
will not bring tank divisions back to Europe. Not only
that, Europeans must come to grips with the fact that
their ally might need its assets for more urgent purposes
elsewhere. And even if that were not the case, they
might face a reluctant or inward-looking administration, Congress, or public opinion. In sum, Europeans

The German Marshall Fund of the United States

September 2015

Transatlantic Security and Future of NATO Series

Policy Brief
should not presume that the United States will continue
to supply the backbone of Europes defense in all contingencies.
There can be no question that Europes states need to
improve their defense and deterrence particularly if
they can no longer free-ride on U.S. capabilities. This
requires, among other things, increased defense budgets
and a renewed focus on hard power. The United States
has a role to play by stopping harping on the 2 percent
(defense expenditures relative to GDP) benchmark;
simply spending more does not solve problems.
Instead, the United States should help Europeans figure
out how to develop their capabilities, use their budgets
more intelligently, and how to create more common
European assets and forces. That, and only that, will
allow them to deter threats and defend themselves. It
will also make them better allies.
The United States should help Europeans improve the
software for their hard power: intelligence, analysis,
foresight, doctrines, planning, coordination. It should
also help them think through how to create resilience at
the national and the EU level. And, yes, Europeans have
some governance and leadership problems to resolve
in the EU; the United States is not helping them deal
with those if it plays its bilateral relationships in Europe
against each other. That is one thing one can safely leave
to the Russians.
Europeans (some of them, anyway) understand why
some in the United States might want to deliver arms to
the Ukrainian government. Ukrainians have a right to
defend themselves against aggression. But consider that
the impact of such an action will be felt by the Ukrainians and their European neighbors long before the
United States ever notices it. Consult with the Europeans, and listen to them: will that scenario create more
stability, or escalation?

The views expressed in GMF publications and commentary are the

views of the author alone.

About the Author

Constanze Stelzenmller is the Robert Bosch Senior Fellow with
theCenter on the United States and Europeat Brookings. Prior to
working at Brookings, she was a senior transatlantic fellow with GMF
and the former director of GMFs Berlin office.

About GMF
The German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF) strengthens
transatlantic cooperation on regional, national, and global challenges
and opportunities in the spirit of the Marshall Plan. GMF does this by
supporting individuals and institutions working in the transatlantic
sphere, by convening leaders and members of the policy and business
communities, by contributing research and analysis on transatlantic
topics, and by providing exchange opportunities to foster renewed
commitment to the transatlantic relationship. In addition, GMF
supports a number of initiatives to strengthen democracies. Founded
in 1972 as a non-partisan, non-profit organization through a gift from
Germany as a permanent memorial to Marshall Plan assistance, GMF
maintains a strong presence on both sides of the Atlantic. In addition
to its headquarters in Washington, DC, GMF has offices in Berlin,
Paris, Brussels, Belgrade, Ankara, Bucharest, and Warsaw. GMF also
has smaller representations in Bratislava, Turin, and Stockholm.

Contact
Dr. Alexandra de Hoop Scheffer
Director, Paris Office
The German Marshall Fund of the United States
Tel: +33 1 47 23 47 18
Email: adehoopscheffer@gmfus.org

One thing is certain: Only if Europe resolves its own security dilemmas will it ever be able to join the United States
in providing stability and security on a more global level.

The German Marshall Fund of the United States

September 2015